The McGraw Internships

A core mission of the McGraw Center for Business Journalism is to promote the development of future business journalists by providing young reporters with the training and skills needed to succeed in the field. In addition to providing scholarships for a number of students at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism each year who specialize in business reporting, the McGraw Center also offer stipends to several business journalism students each summer who undertake an internship at a media company. The stipends allow students to gain valuable training through journalism internships that would otherwise be unpaid, thereby grounding their studies in on-the-job experience.

The McGraw Center is proud to have awarded internship stipends to the following students:

The McGraw Interns – Class of 2017

Oscar Gonzalez

Gonzalez spent the summer as a general assignment intern working on local news at WNYC, the New York public radio station. A native of San Antonio, Texas who received a bachelor’s degree in communications from Texas A&M University-San Antonio in 2016, He was the editor-in-chief of the student digital outlet, The Mesquite, while an undergraduate, and has also written regularly on technology for his own news website since 2008. He chose the business concentration because he realized that money played a key role in many stories he’s written, on subjects as varied as technology, politics and local news. His goal is to take what he’s learning at CUNY, along with his previous experience, to dive further into overlooked stories.

Teddy Grant

Grant worked as an intern at DNAInfo, a digital site that concentrates on New York City neighborhoods. His beats included breaking news, city events, politics and culture. A 2012 graduate of the University of South Florida with a Bachelor’s degree in professional and technical writing, Grant worked in the health insurance industry before applying to CUNY, which offers him a unique perspective on health-related news. He is interested in the intersection of political, business and technology news, and chose to study business journalism to better understand the role money plays in the different sectors.

Liz Ramanand

Ramanand split her summer internship doing work for three jointly-managed sites, ScottishFinancialNews.com, NorthernFinancialReview.com and Centerforce’s IPStrategyNews.com. She covered international business news for the trio, in addition to managing their social media accounts. The Queens native graduated in 2011 from Brooklyn College with a dual degree in Journalism and English. Prior to coming to the journalism school, Ramanand worked for six years as an arts and music journalist and photographer for Townsquare Media. She has long been interested in combining her passion for the arts with her interest in business, and hopes to develop a strong business journalism career when she graduates.

The McGraw Interns – Class of 2016

Tanvi Acharya

Acharya interned at InvestmentNews, a digital news site and weekly magazine for financial advisors. She was a general assignment reporter covering stories on the financial services industry. A native of Mumbai, India, Acharya graduated from Rutgers University in 2015 with a major in journalism and double minor in English and economics. She hopes to combine her passion for economics with her interest in journalism to write stories that help society understand this complex topic.

Josh Keefe

Keefe spent the summer at The New York Observer, where he wrote on subjects ranging from the financial difficulties facing circuses to rooftop vineyards in Brooklyn. His work previously appeared in The New York Times, Slate, Gothamist, DNAinfo and the Bangor Daily News. The Maine native, a 2007 graduate of Skidmore College in English, chose the business concentration in order to be able to “follow the money” and understand the economic motivations underlying the stories he covers.

Zameena Mejia

Mejia covered the sportswear industry for Footwear News, reporting on retail companies, fashion industry trends, tech and legislation for the publication’s consumer website and large format print magazine. A magna cum laude graduate of SUNY New Paltz with a double major in journalism and Spanish, her goal is to write stories about business and the economy that show how they impact the lives of young consumers, especially millennials, Hispanics and women.

Harini Chakrapani

Chakrapani interned at Crain’s New York Business, where she wrote news stories about financial deals, acquisitions and startups in the New York City tech industry. A native of Chennai, India and a graduate of the University of Madras, she worked as an entertainment reporter for a Bollywood magazine in Dubai before coming to the CUNY J-School. She is passionate about technology and healthcare and hopes to break the biggest business news stories from these industries.

The McGraw Interns – Class of 2015

Danni Santana

Santana spent the summer as an intern at Crain’s New York Business, where he worked on the web desk and wrote stories as a general assignment reporter. A Bronx native who graduated from CUNY’s York College in 2013 with a degree in Journalism and a minor in Communications Technology. Santana covered York’s athletics department for the school newspaper. He hopes to combine his love of sports with the training he received at CUNY to cover sports business.

Following graduation, he was hired as an associate editor at Insurance Networking News.

Rajashree Chakravarty

Chakravary interned during the summer at Source Media, a digital site for financial advisors and other Wall Street professionals. She covered news and events, writing stories for its two publications, Financial Planning and On Wall Street. A native of Kolkata, India, she wrote for local travel and tourism web sites after receiving her masters degree in English from Burdwan University in West Bengal in 2005. She freelanced for numerous publications after moving to the United States with her husband in 2008. Her goal is to do business journalism that makes a difference; to write about economic and business stories in a compelling way that helps average people better understand this complex subject.

Following graduation, she is continuing to freelance for publications both in the U.S. and abroad.

The McGraw Interns – Class of 2014

Mark Fahey

Fahey spent the summer of 2014 at Crain’s New York Business, where he split his time between writing news stories and assisting in research and web development. Fahey is especially interested in the economics of agriculture, real estate, technology and any project that involves sifting through large sets of data. After graduating with a degree in biology from Washington University in St. Louis in 2010, his first feature stories were published in Thailand in 2011. Mark covered education, cops, courts and the economy for the Springfield News-Sun and Washington Court House Record-Herald in Ohio before enrolling at CUNY.

Following graduation in December, Fahey is now working as a reporter and data specialist at a new data unit being set up at CNBC.com.

Brianna McGurran

McGurran interned during the summer of 2014 at Oregon Public Broadcasting, Portland’s NPR station. McGurran helped produce the daily live news show Think Out Loud, which covers business, politics and the arts. McGurran previously held an internship at public radio station WNYC, where she wrote scripts and edited audio for broadcast. Among her favorite assignments for WNYC: covering the economic impact of New York Mayor Bill de Blasio’s new affordable housing plan. McGurran graduated from New York University in 2009 with a degree in English.

Brianna McGurran is a reporter for NerdWallet, the personal finance site.

Reem Nasr

Nasr worked as an intern in the news department at Michigan Radio during the summer, where she focused on the economic revitalization of Detroit. A graduate of New York University, where she majored in journalism and Middle Eastern studies, Nasr studied broadcast journalism with a concentration in business reporting. A producer of Muslim State of Mind, a weekly radio show that airs on WBAI in New York, she previously served as a producer on the Brian Lehrer Show at WNYC. Reem is a contributor to PolicyMic, a digital news site for millennials. She is of Egyptian and Lebanese descent and is interested in affairs of the Muslim American community. Fluent in English and Arabic, she hopes to continue her journalistic work in America and abroad.

Max Willens

Willens is a native New Yorker who plans to spend his career covering the economics of entertainment. He spent the summer working at Ad Age, where he focused on music and data projects. After brief stints as a music blogger, DJ, copywriter and social media strategist, he decided to pursue business journalism in earnest in late 2012. His work has appeared online in WIRED, Crain’s New York, The Village Voice and Billboard PRO, and he has blogged for outlets ranging from The New York Times to MIDEM, the largest music business conference in the European Union. He periodically thinks about leaving New York, but cannot figure out why anyone would want to live anywhere else.

Willens became the media reporter for the International Business Times following graduation, and now works at Digiday.